Hamer Duotone

Hamer Duotone 1995 USA, 22 frets,semi hollow, bullet hole model.2 humbuckers with a piezo bridge.
Duncan 59s for the HBs not sure on the piezo. Passive electronics,sunburst finish, nicely done. Maple top, mahogany back and neck, double cutaway,non adjustable piezo bridge, string thru body design,Schaller tuners, 24.5 inch scale, beefy c shaped neck.Hamer case and truss rod adjustment tool with integral phillips screw driver.

Sound is amazing, throaty humbucker sound from the neck and beautiful creamy distorttion in the middle, bridge pickup screams like a banshee. Piezo pickup does a really great imitation of an acoustic which you can tweak with the 4 mini pots on the back. Variety of sounds is mind blowing. Cant put it down.

Ebay prize so I had a little set up to do. The thing literally fell into tune with just a minor bit of tweaking. The bridge is fixed so all I could do was dress the frets and put a little relief in the neck. Finish is excellent with the usual players wear. This axe is a player.Controls work excellent.

The reliability question will have to wait. I never gig without a backup

No experience

Playing for over 35 years,other gear: Fenders,G&Ls, Gibsons,Epis,Magnatone,Moserite,Hanocasters,Musicman,Roland.
What I love about this axe is the versatility and the tone. This was my first Hamer (I have since bought an Eclipse). And it doesn't have to be lost or stolen, I am already searching for another one

I bought this guitar used off of eBay, where the previous owner had replaced whatever came stock with a Seymour Duncan Super Distortion and a SD '59. Other than that, it's the stock Korean made model. String-thru-body tailpiece, active acoustic preamp/eq thingy...

What inspired me to try this model out, and eventually buy it was playing a friend's hollow-body PRS. I fell in love with it, but wasn't ready to shell out the big bucks on a serious axe like that.

Been playing it for a little over 3 months now, and I have very few complaints. I'll get into that below. The electronics are simple, the switches are solid, and it's a quality guitar.

Actually it's a bit smaller than I was expecting, but the more I play it, the more I love it. However, it really could use a common output, where you get both acoustic AND electric outs. I may have to open it up and do a quick solder-job to make that.

I play a lot of Mark Knopfler-esque stuff, but I also like to play hard rock/ heavy metal type of music. I wanted a guitar that didn't lock me into any one style, and looked good. I'm a sucker for the tobacco sunburst paint job. This has a nice open tone to it, which works well for almost everything except heavy HEAVY metal, where you need an Ibanez to really reach.

It has a very rich sound, although sometimes I wish the tone went past ten. It's not bright sounding at all right now, although I'll be putting some Gibson PAFs in there soon enough.

Surprisingly, the guitar isn't noisy or anything like that when I turn the gain all the way up. Using a Fender Stage 112 and a Boss Metal Zone pedal (we're not going for subtle here), I'm able to crank out Incubus songs with tone almost identical to the original recording. The notes are clear and true, and switching between pickups gives a solid, yet varied range of tone.

The acoustic side is a bit lacking on its own, however. I needed to run it through a true acoustic preamp to get the kind of tone that I wanted. It wasn't the "flick and switch and you have an acoustic" type of action I was hoping for. And actually, even when I did this, the difference between the acoustic and electric output wasn't all that different.

I really like how much of a wide open tone I can get with the DuoTone. The natural sustain and decay of the notes is perfect for me. With a chorus pedal, this thing sounds as sweet as ...umm... as a really sweet thing.

This guitar is beautiful. Theh wood is a dark dark red with black grain all throughout the back and neck. The front is a light sunburst with white bonding around the corners. It looks like a million dollars, and on stage, it looks even better.

The action is surprisingly low for a korean semi-hollow body. I was expecting something along the lines of a regular Hamer with a hole punched in the body. The action is totally even from the first fret to the 22nd (or is it 21st? eh). Even with the low action, I can pound away on the lower strings (I use 11's) and not get any buzz. Unbelievable.

Nothing came broken or out of place to me. Of course, I'm the second owner, but still... nothing wrong here. However, *something* makes this guitar go out of tune very easily. I'm not sure if it's the nut or the tuners, but it's worth noting because I saw somebody else mention it.

Again, this guitar looks great, and is easy to play. It has taken the official title of "Couch Guitar" in the apartment. C'mon, you all know you have one.

No problems yet...

Couldn't tell you

I've been playing guitar for 8 years, and I've gone between an Ibanez and a Tele goign through Fender amps for the most part. I think this is the most I'd consider paying for an import guitar, and I was a bit hesitant about a semi-hollow body Korean import, but I've yet to see any real flaws. Like I said, I'm going to replace the pickups, but that's just a personal preference.

All of my guitar playing buddies who have played it want one. I haven't tried out the American version (which goes for something like $2500), but I'm sure that plays like a dream. If you see one hanging on the wall at a music shop, pick it up and try it out.

If it was stolen or lost, I'd probably be really pissed off for a few days, but then I'd get over it and probably find another toy.

This truly is a great guitar for the money. My dad has a PRS Acoustic/electric guitar that costs more than 10 times what this cost, and I love this guitar just as much.

It is a Korean import that is actual a quality instrument. It has two Seymour Duncan Humbuckers and a piezo bridge pickup. Two input jacks, one electric, one acoustic. A volume and a tone selector for the humbuckers and a seperate volume selector for the piezo. It has a mahogany neck and back with a spruce top. Neck-Through. I believe that teh bridge is a Fishman like the ones that Fender uses on it's acoustic models. It has the Gotoh style tuners.

The neck is one thing that surprised me most. Most Korean made guitars have very poor worksmanship in the neck, but this guitar is an exception. It has a smooth, c-shaped neck like a Gibson and the fretwork is flawless. You won't have to worry about slicing your hand open on poor fretwork (which I have done on more that one occasion).

I like to play a little bit of everything and so far this guitar can handle more of it than I thought it would. It can play blues, country, rock, hard rock (not metal though - but if you are into metal you won't want a guitar like this anyway. You can get a very bright sound out of the rear humbucker and you can get a smooth, jazzy tone from the front.

The action is perfect. I get no buzzing when it is played correctly. The only complaint I would have is that the bridge alignment is slightly off, but it still sounds great and you would have to be looking closely to notice. This guitar is new and has no real scrapes or dings to speak of.

I would have no problem taking this guitar up on stage. I would never go on stage without a backup in the rafters, but I trust this guitar to make it through the evening. THe finish seems fine, however, there is no pickguard so I'm sure that with time the finish will take a beating. The hardware seems to be well installed and they really didn't seem to cut the usual corners that most Korean-built guitars have.

I've never needed to use them.

I have been playing for over a decade now. If it were lost I'd have absolutely zero hesitation to buy another. For the money this guitar is very hard to beat.

This is the Korean Import Duotone. I bought it on eBay and it was represented as a second, but I can't find a mark on it. Basically, it was mint.

The description is as many people previously listed... On the top are two Duncan Designed humbuckers and a piezo acoustic bridge pickup, 3 way switch plus volume and tone knobs for the humbuckers and a volume knob for the piezo. There's a 3 way switch to go between electric, mixed or acoustic tones. The piezo controls are accessed through little holes in the back of the guitar with jeweler's screwdrivers. In other words, set it and forget it.

The tuners are a typical imported enclosed type and I had to tighten the tension in them to help keep the guitar in tune. Otherwise I would have had to replace them.

The finish is a pretty sunburst. It's a genuinely attractive guitar with double cutaway, almost symetrical shape.

The neck is what attracted me to Hamers in general. It's reasonably wide and somewhat fat, more like an acoustic guitar. I have big hands and I'd love to transplant this neck on my Strats and Telecasters.

I give it an 8 only because the tuners gave me some grief initially.

I play country, blues, old rock, some instrumental... I'm sort of like people who say, "I don't know art, I know what I like." Well, I'm that way about music. Show me something I like and I don't care what you call it.

For travelling around to play with friends, it's a very handy guitar. The acoustic tones are not something I expect from my Martin or Tacoma, but they are a whole lot better than a bunch of electric guitars I played in this price range with so called acoustic capabilities. (Parker P38, Telecaster w/Fishman Bridge, Fernandes Monteray) Basically, an Ibanez S2020 for $1100 was the only guitar I definately heard superior acoustic tones from. (drool!!!)

Where this little guitar really shines is as an electric guitar. The pickups might say Duncan Designed on them and many people discount the idea that means anything worthwhile, (not REAL Duncans), but I'll argue until I'm blue in the face that these are some of the gutsiest humbuckers I've ever played. They are dead quiet and they have a snarl to them that is like a humbucker version of something a Texas blues player would invent. It's totally different than my Les Paul. You can play the neck pickup and make it reasonably sweet and mellow for jazz, or you can play the bridge pickup and it's got some bite.

Notice I said "reasonably" and "some"... While the pickups are REALLY capable, the pots could probably be changed to provide more variance in tone. You'd have one hell of a guitar with better pots. Maybe I should find my Stewert McDonald catalogue when I finish writing this.

Mixing electric and acoustic tones is an interesting sound, but in moderation. I've had the guitar 6 months and generally play it mixed on full bore electric with the volume of the acoustic capabilities blended in at about 6-7. Something about a piezo quack comes through above that, but then there are some songs that works in. Like someone before me observed, this would be a truly great guitar if the acoustic controls were on the top of the guitar like an acoustic, instead of this goofy idea of putting them on the back. Personally, I blend out the mid range almost completely, boost the treble to about 3/4 and throw the bass all the way up to accomodate the most realistic acoustic tone through my amps. I usually play it through my Fender Acoustasonic, or believe it or not, for really nice acoustic tone, a little 15 watt bass amp.

If you get a Duotone, also get a Y-cable for it so you can plug into both 1/4" inlets and mix tones. Occasionally I use 2 separate cables to my recorder and get one electric track and one acoustic track. Doing the EQ and mix later on is how I decided the guitar might benefit from better pots. I've also used 2 cables to 2 amps. Your mileage may vary.

I give the Duotone an 8 primarily for it's electric guitar capabilities and 1 more just because it can act acoustic when I want to. Hmmm... that's a 9.

I got my Hamer used from a shop in Nashville, (via eBay), but they had new strings and a good setup on it when it arrived. Since it has an acoustic bridge with a saddle like an acoustic guitar, (as opposed to a Fishman Powerbridge resembling an electric guitar saddle), there isn't a lot you can do to adjust the setup shy of cranking the neck. I left it alone for a few weeks since it was coming to the heat and humidity of Miami, but nothing has happened to it in the 6 months I've had it. Basically the action is between an electric and acoustic, but it works without fret buzz, so I haven't messed with it.

I loved the pickups as soon as I played the guitar, so I haven't messed with them either.

At the risk of repeating myself, it's a cosmetically pretty guitar. Across the board, I think Hamers probably carry more points for pride of ownership than any brand I can imagine other than PRS with 10 tops and birds. The joints, stain/paint, binding, neck finish, electronics installations... All are top rate.

I'm a hobbiest that occasionally plays out with friends and only occasionally gigs. I'd never play without a backup, but I'd certainly use this guitar for live play. (Hmmm... dead play??)

Basically, I think this is a pretty tough little axe.

Never had to deal with Hamer... I've heard good things from friends who have though.

I've been playing 35 years, although only real seriously for the past 5. I also play a 94 American Strat, a Fat Tele, a Std Tele with Bill Lawrence pickups, a 97 Les Paul Studio, a Danelectro Hodad, a Peavey Ecoustic, Yamaha Compass A/E, Martin DX-1, Tacoma Chief... and some others. I play them through a Fender Acoustasonic, Frontman 15, Bassman 15 or a 1975 Vibro Champ... also a new little Hiwat Bulldog 30 I'm pleasantly surprised with.

What do I like about this guitar? It's electric tone is awesome, it's acoustic tone is useful for not having to take another guitar with me, it's light to wear for hours at a time, it's visually pretty, it's got a great neck, NOW it stays in tune, it fun and it's different. I love to play something like a bluesy electric number and after it's over, flip the switch and play some sweet sounding little acoustic fingerpicked riff and have friends look around and wonder where the hell it came from.

Based on the electric tone alone, I'd replace this guitar in a minute if it were lost or stolen. It's too much fun.

This is the Korean doutone. Mahogany body, spruce top, rosewood bridge, semi-hollow flat top with f-hole. Electric: 1 vol, 1 tone 2 duncan designed humbuckers. Acoustic: 1 vol knob, 3 band eq and gain on back of guitar. 3 way toggle for acoustic, acoustic & electric, electric. I wish the eq for the acoustic were on the front of the guitar and not just adjustable with a eyeglass screwdriver.

This is where this guitar shines. I bought this guitar for both the acoustic and electric tones. I had trouble with feedback with my old Yamaha acoustic electric so I thought I'd give this a try. At very high volumes no feedback!!! I had no idea that it would sound this good through the P.A. It is crystal clear and doesn't have that piezo quack when you hammer on a note or chord like most acoustic electrics have. The single note lines have dynamics and sound perfect and the chords sound full and clean. The real test was in the recording studio through powered mackie speakers, and it sounded even better. I plug the acoustic jack into the P.A. always. I also like the electric sounds through the humbuckers. You won't get that single coil strat clarity and treble bite but you can get great warm earthy tones. The clean sound is nice and mellow through my Fender hotrod amp and with my origional ts-9 it really shines. I can set it up to get hollow body type sound. With distortion it sounds full even with the fender distortion. With my pod I can get raunchy Marshall and Boogie tones that are full and agressive with great sustain. The fuzz sounds can get down right evil. With my friend's Flextone it seemed to bring the amp to life. I was surprised at how loud I can play without feedback, if you play really loud this might be a problem. With my Doutone and Fender strat I can get a huge variety of tones with very little compromise.

When I got this delivered by fedex from across the USA it needed a small truss adjustment. I don't know if it was the trip across the country or just wasn't setup right (buzzing strings). The frets could be sanded around the edges a little more, I'm sure the USA hamers are cleaner that way (no big deal to me). The electric jack pops once in a while if you bump it too much. My main complaint is that it goes out of tune too easy, I don't know if it's the nut or the tuning pegs. I usually have to tune it at least once during practice or gigs. Otherwise it was setup good. The playability is perfect. I love the feel of the neck. It's one of those guitars that you just don't want to put down. I gave it a 7 because of the tuning

I've only had it 3 months without problems. I would never use a guitar without a backup at a gig, but I'm 99% sure I wouldn't need one, but you never know.

I have no idea. I don't know what the support is like for Korean Hamers. It's Kamen music (ovation).

I've been playing for 22yrs. I pride myself in tone and this thing delivers. I thought I would never buy a guitar without playing it first, but this was cheap enough that I figured I could get my money back selling it if I didn't like it. I can't believe this could take over as my number one guitar. I've played a ton of guitars over the years and am pretty picky but I heard a lot of good things about Hamer and played a friend's Hamer USA and some others at music stores and really liked them. I'm not a good acoustic player but with this thing I can wail and get the sounds I've heard in my head but can't get my hands to do consistantly on a regular acoustic. If it were lost or stolen I would order one immedeatly. This guitar makes my setup exremely versatile. Mate this with a strat and you can get almost any sound from acoustic to hollow-body cleans to aggressive distortions with the doutone and the crystal clean and biting distortion with the strat.

Mine is a 1994 model with the standard configuration (for a Duo Tone) of dual humbuckers and a piezo mounted in a wood, non-adjustable bridge. The finish is orange burst, with a sound chamber on the upper part of the body. The body is double cutaway, which makes getting to the upper frets pretty easy.

Pretty common stringing - they pass through the body from the back and pass over the non-adjustable bridge. I believe the tuners are Schallers (although Hamer occasionally varies from this).

I've had mine for about a week so I'm still getting used to the sound. I love the fact that I can get an acoustic and an electric sound out of the same guitar. (And do this in a truly diverse manner rather than kicking the overdrive in on a piezo pickup. I did have to do some tweaking of my amp settings to get the acoustic pickup to "warm up." Then again, I may have had to tweak a little bit more because my Rockman XP-100 is a bit noisy and a bit on the twangy side on when the EQ is set flat.

I've been very happy with the tone of the humbuckers - I believe they're DiMarzio's, and the wood bridge really gives them a nice fat, warm tone without being too brittle.

I bought mine used so I'm sure the original setup is long gone. The action is very low, and it's a 50/50 situation. I love the neck as it has the same thickness at the nut and at the body. But, the strings are a little buzzy. Unfortunately because of the bridge setup there's not much that can be done (at least easily). Otherwise, the frets, fit and finish are still in excellent condition for a 7+ year old guitar.

The volume and tone controls work just fine, and the pickup switch for the humbuckers is working well. On the other hand, the selector switch for which pickup system is in use (acoustic/humbucker or both) is a little squirrely. The humbucker setting works fine, as does the acoustic setting. However the mixed (humbucker/acoustic) tends to "pop" out of position sometimes.

I don't gig out so I don't really know how well the guitar would stand up to live events. Given that Hamers are solidly built I don't think it would really be a problem. The hardware has held up fine so far, and I think it will continue to do so. I can't say that the strap buttons are original, sinc I don't think Hamer installs strap-lock type buttons as the norm, but they're definitely not going anywhere.

I bought mine used so I don't have any stories to tell about support. I know Hamer goes out of their way to provide good customer service, but as they're also a small shop it may take some time to get your guitar back if you send it to them.

I've been playing for about 15 years although never seriously. I've got other Hamers in my collection as well as a Les Paul. I would definitely buy another one if this were lost or stolen as I love the versatility of the guitar.

2000 Hamer Duotone (Korean import)
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- double cut-away semi-hollow mahogany body, carved spruce top w/ F-hole, 2 piece mahogany set-in neck with 22 fret shortscale rosewood fingerboard, "jazz-burst" finish
- 2 seymour duncan designed humbucking pickups
- under-saddle piezo pickup with active preamp (3 band EQ and gain settings accessable through the back panel [tool included])
- dual output jacks (1 for electric pickups, 1 for piezo)
- 3 control pots: volume (electric), tone (electric), and volume (piezo)
- 2 3-way switches: electric pickup selection and electric/piezo blend

After a bit of work (see next category), this guitar has become a key part of my collection both in the studio and onstage. It is a pleaure play, hear, and look at.
It is right at home playing jazz, blues, funk, rock, fusion, even orchestral arrangements.. . I wouldn't recommend it for metal or the like (A- the semi-hollow design would severely increase unwanted HF feedback, and B- it's too damn pretty).. . It's got a beautiful, clean, bell-like tone, free of fret buzz.
The Duncan pickups that it came with aren't that amazing (they are, however, much better than the pickups that ship with most other $500 guitars), and they are more than enough when put through a tube amp (and ideally a spectral enhancer).
The neck pickup is warm and smooth, the bridge pickup is sharp (not too sharp) and bright (not too bright), and the blend (which is out-of phase) is bouncy and full.
The piezo pickup and preamp will stand up next to that of my $1200 Ovation (and actually sound quite similar).
This is a light, semi-hollow guitar, and therefore tends to resonate low notes and high notes longer (watch out for LF and HF feedback), and tends to die out earlier in mid-range notes (not horribly or even noticeably to most).

I was quite dissapointed with the way this guitar came factory shipped. This guitar came out of the box in need of the following work:
- truss rod adjustment
- saddle adjustment
- fretboard and fret leveling (the fretboard bulged up toward the nut on one side, and the frets along with it)
- the EQ board was a problem (I re-stripped and secured the faulty groundwire connection only to find out that the gain pot was defective), my dealer ended up providing me with a new EQ board.

If I weren't capabable and willing to do the work myself, I would have returned it. It would have cost me an additional $100+ just to make it playable.

On the other hand, the stop is seemlessly matched, the neck and body woods, paints, and bindings are beautiful, and the finish is thick and smooth.

The semi-hollow body makes it overall a pretty fragile instrument (it would take little effort to crush it), so I would definately recommend a hard case for travel, but as far as actual playing, it maintains tuning through some pretty drastic string bends and vibratos, and the hardware/electronics seem steadfast and dependable.

I've never actually dealt with Hamer (Kaman music) in my ordeal with this guitar, but the shop I bought it from was a great help. :)

(see "Sound" category)

I believe this guitar was made in the USA in 1993. IT has the standard Duotone controls 1 volume and 1 tone for the electric portion, 1 volume for the accoustic, a three way toggle to select electric, accoustic or electric and accoustic and a three way toggle for the pickups.

It is the older model that has the three circular sound holes as opposed to the newer f-hole model. It is equipped with Seymour Duncan pickups that are the finest sounding pickups I have ever heard. They are very full and rich sounding. You can really make this thing scream!

This is the Clark Kent of guitars. Mild mannered, deceptive conservative looks, but let this baby go into the phone booth and plug into a Fender Tube and it can leap tall buildings!

This is without question the finest guitar I have ever owned. I've owned and still own several guitars by Gibson, Fender, Yamaha, Peavey, Kramer, Gretch and Epiphone. Not one comes close overall.

This guitar is very versatile. You can play hard rock, jazz, pop or country with ease.

I find the neck to be excellent, also. It is what I consider to be middle of the road - not as thin as I would like, but certainly not a fat neck.

When you open the back of the guitar The electronics compartment is finished off as nicely as the outside of the guitar. It has an adjustable eq on/in the electronics compartment. This works flawlessly.

I'm trying to find something to complain about, but it is nearly impossible. This is one great guitar! My one complaint against the guitar is it seems to go through more 9v batteries then I would like.
I know that's weak, but I can't find anything to complain about!

I play almost all originals that are mostly 70s stlye rock/pop or country/country rock.

I use it mostly with a Fender Hot Rod Deville with 4-10s, but I also use a Marshall (not sure of the model) practice amp and I sometimes use an old Sunn (solid state) with 100w and 2-12s.

It obviously sounds much better with the Fender tubes, but it does fine with the others.

I haven't been able to eq out some of the booming bottom on the guitar, so sometimes in soft passages, it is more balsy than I like.

There is one slight teeny tiny finsh flaw near the neck. You have to get in just the right light and at just the right angle to see it, though. Overall this thing is finished out like a Rolls Royce.

The fit and finish are every bit as good as PRS. It is finished off better than many "custom built" guitars I've seen.

I mostly write and record, but do play out some. There have been no problems with the durability of the guitar. I usually play it for 10-12 hours per week with gust up to 25.

I would (and do) gig without a backup!

I've been playing for 22 years and own 6 guitars at the moment, but have owned tons! I have many many pieces of equipment - lots or froo froo, but mostly I play this thing straight onto a Fender tube amp. I find that I don't need a lot of extras, since this guitar is very versatile and you can evoke many emotions from the Seymours and the Fender tube amp.

If I ever lost this guitar, I would immediately get another! If I could onlt have one guitar, this would be it! (Don't tell my '64 J-45, she thinks she's my baby!)

1999 korean hamer duotone,acustic-electric,double cutaway,mahogany semihollow body spruce top,cherry sunburst finish,22 frets,two duncan designed humbuckers,piezo pickup(for acustic sound).vey light good on the shoulder,the neck is a little fat kind of a epi les paul's neck,even with the double cutaway the access to the higher frets is not that great.

it suits any style of rock derived music,from soft alternative to punk to death metal,i play with 3 bands,rock-punk-metal and i can get what i need for each style with this guitar.i use a fender roc pro 1000 with a 1x12 celestion cab and it sounds bigger than life,though the acustic pickup has to be conected straight to the pa the get the acustic sound,through the amp it does not sound acustic at all.the pickups were a little muddy so i put a duncan jb in the bridge,now it sounds great.you can get any sound from this guitar,it has an output for the acustic and another for the electric and a toggle switch for changing between the two or the two at the same time,all in all you have two guitar in one,you can even equalize the acustic sound to your liking(3band equalizer).

it what set up nicely,tha action was low enough for my taste,no flaws on the finish.

it is light so it is great for live shows and in my opinion it can withstand live use,everything is solid,the finish gets dirty easily otherwise great.iused it recently in a show and it was great but i had a backup just in case

havent dealt with hamer

ive been playing for 14 years,i had lots of guitar but no fenders or gibsons,i also use a epi korina sg which is great.i always try to get the best guitar for the money and this one is .if it get stolen or lost i would get a used usa made model because it has duncan pickups(59 and jb).i love almost everything about this guitar except fot the fat neck.i wanted a double cutaway and an acustic so i got both in one.